Pop singer Billie Eilish opened up recently about the cost of fame, and how she dealt with being sexualized as a teenage celebrity.
During an interview with Variety, the 21-year-old recording artist said “being a woman is just such a war,” particularly for those in the public eye. She also talked about her body type and the fact that she opens herself up to being sexualized and objectified if she wears anything that reveals any degree of skin.
Men, the “Happily Ever After” singer said, are not held to the same standard.
“Nobody ever says a thing about men’s bodies,” she told the magazine.
Billie Eilish says men don’t face criticism about their bodies because girls are nice:
— Pop Base (@PopBase) November 13, 2023
“Nobody ever says a thing about men’s bodies. If you’re muscular, cool. If you’re not, cool. If you’re rail thin, cool. If you have a dad bod, cool. If you’re pudgy, love it! Everybody’s happy… pic.twitter.com/xaihWNyjE3
“If you’re muscular, cool; if you’re not, cool,” Eilish explained of the way men’s bodies are discussed. “If you’re rail thin, cool. If you have a dad bod, cool. If you’re pudgy, love it! Everybody’s happy with it. You know why? Because girls are nice. They don’t give a [expletive] because we see people for who they are!”
When she rose to stardom at 13 years old for her song “Ocean Eyes,” which was on SoundCloud, Eilish said she was immediately bombarded with questions about her dating life, her sexual orientation, and her physical appearance. As a result, she started wearing baggy clothes to cover her body.
Listen to them on the latest episode of “Quick Start” 👇
The inundation of deeply persona questions, she said, felt “weird and upsetting.”
“[I] didn’t want people to have access to my body, even visually,” she said. “I wasn’t strong enough and secure enough to show it. If I had shown it at that time, I would have been completely devastated if people had said anything.”
“I’ve never felt like a woman, to be honest with you,” the singer-songwriter continued. “I’ve never felt desirable. I’ve never felt feminine. I have to convince myself that I’m, like, a pretty girl.”
This is not the first time Eilish has spoken out about sexualization. In 2021, during an interview with Sirius XM host Howard Stern, she opened up about her own addiction to pornography.
“I think porn is a disgrace,” she said. “I used to watch a lot of porn, to be honest. I started watching porn when I was, like, 11. … I think it really destroyed my brain, and I feel incredibly devastated that I was exposed to so much porn.”
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